Page 92 of The Legend
How could this be? How...why?
“Becareful with his head.” I told the paramedic sweeping my tears away with thesleeve of my driver’s suit. “He’s...injured.”
“Kid,we know that.” He barked at me frantically. It wasn’t meant to be rude but aman trying to do his job saving my dad. “Now, I need you to back away. He’slosing a lot of blood right now.”
Iknew that. It was all over the place on me, and him, and pooling in the dirtbelow. His head was bleeding, his nose, ears and mouth. He was vomiting, andmore blood.
Thiswas not good. That was not good at all.
Iwas torn. I wasn’t sure who to run to, my dad or my grandpa. Justin was huddledaround grandpa along with Lane and Cole. Tommy was looking from my dad tograndpa as well wondering who to check on.
Thelanding of the helicopter in the infield caught my attention knowing help wouldsoon come. Where there were once haulers lined up, was cleared for a saferlanding.
Turningmy attention back to the wreck, everything stood still again.
Itwas like watching a horrible aftermath unfurl in slow agonizing motions.Everyone’s once frantic movements were still, to me. Time stopped, wind ceased.My vision on two legends, the greatest racers our sport had ever seen.
Grandpahadn’t moved and showed no signs of response; his body was limp, lifeless asthey performed CPR on him. Paramedics, safety crews, Spencer and Aiden were allcrowded around with Justin holding his neck and head still as they lifted himon the stretcher, continuing CPR.
Justinwas frantically yelling out orders to the paramedics trying to get them tohurry but I think they knew. It hovered in the air, suppressing and vaporouslike the fog.
Twohelicopters landed, one took grandpa first and the other took my dad.
Spencerand Lane went with grandpa while Tommy and I went with my dad. Everyone elsedrove the eighty miles to the University of Iowa hospital where they weretransporting both of them.
Icouldn’t tell you what they were doing to my dad on the way there, everythingseemed rushed and I couldn’t focus. It took all of my control not to vomitright along with him. When we landed, he quit breathing on his own.
Lanemet me outside the trauma center, they performed CPR the entire way on grandpabut nothing was working. When they got him into the trauma center, they hookedhim up to monitors and were able to get a faint heartbeat but brain damage wasa concern at that point.
Lane,Justin and Cole stayed with him while Spencer, Tommy and me followed thestretcher dad was one. Aiden went to get my mom and grandma who knew nothing atthat point.
Theywouldn’t let us in the room; the doors slammed shut behind him while hospitalstaff rushed all around him. The three of us stood there, frozen outside thedoors.
Theyeventually kicked us out into the waiting room to wait with the other families.
That’swhen it hit me that every one of these people in here was experiencing thesesame mind numbing thoughts. Hoping and praying for an outcome that wouldn’tbreak them.
Somehide it well, others didn’t and cried openly.
Theguy next to me talked about needing ice cubes in his water bottle. His wifenodded and looked over their medical financial plan probably wondering if theirmedical insurance covered them.
Anolder man across from Justin was slouched, sleeping. His daughter, I assumed,knitted besides him kicking him occasionally when he snored.
Allof these people were waiting. Just like us.
Weweren’t a famous racing family right then. We were just like everyone else inthat waiting room.
Theguys around me were texting their loved ones, or whatever they were doing but Idid nothing. I sat there staring at the man snoring in front of me, and hisdaughter knitting. I wouldn’t know what to say to Lily at this point and Icouldn’t speak to my mom, I couldn’t be the one to tell her this.
Afteranother moment of silence, I couldn’t sit there any longer.
Spencerand I went back to the trauma center and checked to see if anything changed,they stopped us outside the doors.
Mediahovered too, they wanted to know and soon every single person that was at thatracetrack was at the hospital in the waiting rooms with us. That’s about thetime word got out to the media and our phones were blowing up with phone callsfrom everyone from Simplex, to dad’s crewmembers on his Cup team. They allwanted to know what in the hell went wrong and I couldn’t tell them. I didn’tknow what went wrong.
Untilright now, in that exact moment when I saw the CEO of NASCAR’s number flashacross my phone, I realized what this meant and I scrambled to find some sortof justification.
Thefifteen-time champion to the NASCAR Cup series had been critically injuredracing in something other than what his sponsor paid him to race. I knew whatthat meant for him.
